Christmas
by Jessahme Wren
Summary: S2 AU. Liz faces her first Christmas alone, but is she really alone? She goes to the one person who would understand how she feels. Lizzington. Oneshot.


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To asundayinaugust (Sel), who is brilliant, talented, and kind in equal and incredible measure. Happy birthday and much love. Your friendship means the world to me.

To all my Lizzington shippers; keep the faith my friends. Thanks for taking this beautiful ride with me and Merry Christmas!

AU b/c Naomi and Jennifer should've never happened. Also, writing is cheaper than therapy so a lot of this is cathartic.

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It often starts as early as late October, long before the first frost. The trees still wear their autumn finery as the first of the onslaught begins.

Christmas.

It was more than a day or two at the end of the year. It was a _season. _Somewhere along the way people adopted the holiday as a separate religion, an unusual amalgam of spiritualism and commerce. Pagan houses of worship beckon believers with 50% markdowns and early bird specials. Squint and you might see the baby Jesus, smaller now than the Santa Claus that shares a space with Him in the manger. Christmas was about money and gaudy decorations and humanity's affinity for celebration. Red took a small sip from the crystal tumbler in his hand, the ice jingling.

Christmas was about family.

He swallowed, letting the amber liquid burn away the memories that rose in his throat. Christmas was about family. Christmas was about "Jingle Bells" clumsily played by small fingers, and roast turkey and his wife's lumpy gravy, and the taste of her mouth when he kissed her in the kitchen as the pies burned behind them and neither of them cared. And Christmas was about laughter. His daughter's laughter as the dog licked her face, and his, bubbling from the deepest part of him, a source that had been capped off, a vein that had long run dry.

Christmas was laughter, music, and family. It was light and warmth and knowing…knowing you belonged to someone and that they belonged to you.

He closed his eyes against the cold he could feel even through the window pane. It was snowing, and he watched the flakes swirl, momentarily suspended against the inky black before they scattered on the wind and were gone.

He chewed the inside of his jaw. A splash of color pierced the darkness, a smudge of merlot, of pomegranate and black.

_Lizzie._

Her white face materialized, floating briefly in the void before she stepped into the light of the street lamp. She was wearing her red winter coat and a black woolen hat pulled down over her ears.

Red watched her stop and look up into the vacant eyes of the apartment windows above. She did not see him, he was sure. There were no lights on in the apartment, so his silhouette would have been a mere shadow, an untethered curtain swallowed by darkness.

When the knock came at his door, he was still by the window. "Come in," he said quietly, without ever taking his eyes off the weather.

She turned the knob and stepped inside. The room was not overly warm, but comfortable enough for her to divest herself of her coat and scarf. She wound the end of it around her gloved hand and pulled it through the collar of her coat. "Hey," she said as she draped the scarf over a nearby chair.

He turned around. Lizzie's face was ruddy in patches from the cold, but also pale. Her eyes sparkled, two pieces of ice glinting in a bank of pure snow. Her lips were the color of berries.

"What are you doing here," he said. It was not what he intended to say. He swallowed against the knot in his throat at the mere sight of her.

She smiled without showing any teeth, a prim delicate quirk of her mouth. It was the same smile she had given him when he had reappeared so many months after Anslo.

"I brought you something," she said simply, and withdrew a small bundle he hadn't noticed tucked beneath her arm.

Red looked only at her face. He walked toward her, his arms hanging at his sides. He glanced briefly at the parcel she held out to him without any real interest. She sat it down on a nearby table, looking at him curiously.

Wordlessly, he slipped an arm around her, his face finding her hair. His eyes drifted closed, lost in the ceremony of touching her. It was not often that he did this, but it was accepted now, and tonight of all nights he needed to feel her, to see that she was real and with him...that she was safe. Red felt the rigid frame of her body relax against him, and the hollow ache that was his constant companion sang a little for want of filling. He sighed without bothering to hide it.

She smelled like the wind, and frost, and something delicately feminine. The cold from her clothes prickled his skin, and he wanted suddenly to warm her, to stoke life into her as she had done for him.

"I hope that isn't a Christmas present," he murmured quietly, "because I don't believe in it."

He felt her chuckle against him, and the sensation was a welcome one. "Belief is for when reality is in question," she said lightly. "Christmas is on the calendar, Red. It is very much real."

She withdrew then and shrugged out of her coat. He reached for her hat, his hand arriving at nearly the same time as hers did. Her gloved fingers closed over his wrist, and she looked at him for a moment before allowing him to gently remove it.

She smiled, though there was no humor there. He smoothed her hair with the palm of his hand, and only then did he notice the faint puffiness of her eyes, the cheeks that were burned by salt and not by the winter wind. She had been crying. He pressed his lips together but remained silent.

Liz pulled away from him, grabbing the parcel she had walked in with. It was cylindrical and wrapped in a scarf. Liz began to remove the material to reveal the shiny silver thermos beneath.

"Do you have any mugs?" she called as she walked into the small kitchen, turning on lights as she went. Liz was opening cabinets and drawers and before he had time to answer her, she had two mismatched mugs on the counter and was unscrewing the lid of the thermos.

He sat down at the bar stool and watched her.

"I'm afraid to ask what that might be," he said in an overly serious tone. She poured two mugs full of steaming liquid and looked up at him, a twinkle in her eye.

"You don't trust me Red? You served me homebrew in a Mason jar, remember? AND, it was disgusting. But did I complain?" She shook her head for effect. "Not once."

She smiled at him genuinely then, a full and beautiful smile that lit her face with the memory of sitting on that dusty couch at Hempstead's with Red and watching the sun bleed through the trees.

Red opened his mouth as if to say something, and then closed it again. She laughed softly. "At least my offering is tasty. I like to call this 'Christmas Cheer'-my aunt's recipe." She proffered a mug, smiling. "Go on," she said encouragingly.

Red took the mug in his hand and held it under his nose. The steam hit his face with the warmth of orange spice and liquor, a hot and inviting smell of cinnamon and brandy. He sipped the wassail experimentally, and the smell and taste of it soon enveloped him.

He gave her a small smile. "You were right," he said. It is quite delicious." He cleared his throat. "Thank you," he said quietly.

She nodded, wrapping her hands around the mug, threading her fingers through its handle. She leaned forward slightly, her mouth a firm line. "How do you do this, Red?"

He looked up to see her eyes darken as they misted with tears that wouldn't come. His throat tightened.

"This is my first Christmas alone," she said quietly. She looked down at her mug, at the scarred Formica countertop of Red's latest abode. "Last Christmas, when I lost Sam, at least there was Tom. It was easier." A single tear escaped her lashes and splashed onto the counter. She wiped at her eyes quickly and looked up at Red. "Even though it was fake, I mean—even though _he_ was fake—it was a comfort." She frowned deeply. "This year I don't have anyone."

Red didn't remember holding his breath, but when his lungs burned for want of air he exhaled raggedly and sucked in a breath as best he could through the tightness in his throat.

"You don't," he finally managed. His voice was so quiet that Liz could scarcely hear him. She watched his face. "You avoid it like a coward. You push it down deep enough so it drowns in the dark, so deep the memories can't hurt you because they're no longer yours. They belong to someone else, another person…another time." He choked out a bitter laugh and raised the mug halfway between them. "'Christmas Cheer' also helps."

Liz pursed her lips. "You're not a coward," she said to him. She reached across the counter between them and placed her hand over his. He didn't look at her.

"Red."

He met her eyes then, and there was a warmth there that wasn't present before, a fire sparking and cracking between them, vital and alive. He turned his hand over and laced his fingers with hers.

"And you have me," he said roughly, seeking her eyes. "Remember?"

She smiled. Yes, she remembered. Of course she remembered. She would never forget that night at the Embassy, when it was just the two of them in a roomful of people and he was there, always there, and he promised he wouldn't let anything happen to her. She had him.

His thumb swept languidly over the top of her hand as she looked at their interlaced fingers. _She had him._

Liz looked up without seeing him, closing the distance between them in a breath. She pressed her lips to his.

For a moment neither of them moved. Time seemed to slow, and she could feel his breath against her cheek, steady and warm. Finally, one of his hands went up to cradle her head as he opened to the heat of her mouth.

Lizzie was mulled spices and brandy, both sharp and sweet, and he imagined the warmth of their kiss spreading through his entire body, warming him to the core, and then that same warmth radiating between them. He let his hand slide around to the open collar of her shirt to find the delicate skin there. He felt the rapid thrum of her pulse and couldn't suppress a smile.

She pulled away, but only far enough to feather kisses along the line of his jaw. "And you have me," Liz breathed into his ear. "You're not alone. Not anymore."

She felt him sigh, melting into her shoulder where she leaned over the counter. He tightened his arms around her, the forgotten mugs steaming between them.

"Merry Christmas Red," she said quietly, "if you believe in that sort of thing."

She smiled, and he could feel her lips curl into the crook of his neck. It felt like home, like remembering. It felt like Christmas.

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End file.
